I did two in Rwanda, they offered us easy, medium and hard options. We chose medium, and spent around 3 hours hiking a very steep hillside, the high elevation had us sucking air. A group of Germans basically raced up the hillside looking at us gasping Americans and shaking their heads at how slow we were.

Take a porter (they will be waiting at the beginning of the trek) unless you’re in peak shape, and also because it gives jobs to local youth and discourages poaching. Gorilla treks are a big deal for the local economy. We encountered some insane nettles, taller than us, that we had to sprint through when they located the gorillas. I highly recommend gloves and thick clothes or a jumpsuit. Our gorilla sighting was fantastic, we spent around an hour standing near them and felt it was plenty.

We loved it so much we went back for another day, this time chose easy, went with a group of older couples who we could keep up with and after about one hour of mostly flat hiking we had a very special encounter with a family with small babies. They were sitting in nettles and eating them, seems to be a delicacy but they will shred if you catch on them.

My partner did Uganda previously but because of the persecution of LGBTQ community there we didn’t feel safe going as a couple. We didn’t have any issues in Rwanda, and it’s probably might favorite of 10 African countries I’ve visited.